Prosecutors: Cadden Emails Seized Properly

By Walter F. Roche Jr.

Michigan prosecutors say emails of a former pharmacist charged with second degree murder were properly seized by federal agents and can now be used in the pending cases in Livingston Circuit Court.
In an 11-page filing with seven detailed attachments, attorneys for Michigan Attorney General's office disputed claims by the former pharmacist that his emails were seized illegally when federal agents raided the New England Compounding Center in October of 2012.
Cadden's lawyer had asked for an order barring use of the email contending that the first federal search warrant issued Oct. 16 was deficient and the Oct. 25 was an improper attempt to paper over the original's omissions.
In the reply Assistant Attorney Generals Deborah Hart and Gregory Townsend said that the electronic equipment was seized legally through a seach warrant approved by a federal magistrate.
The arguments come as both sides gear up for a trial on the second degree murder charges facing Cadden and Glenn Chin. Cadden was the president and part owner of NECC. Chin was a supervising NECC pharmacist.
The two are charged in the deaths of 11 Michigan patients who died after being injected with NECC steroids loaded with deadly fungi.
The attorney general's filing notes that the challenged data was in evidence in the federal trials of Cadden and Chin and went without challenge. The two were convicted of federal racketeering, conspiracy and mail fraud charges but not of second degree murder.
In the filing Hart and Townsend said the search warrants were very specific and sought both paper and electronic form.
The filing states that after the first search warrant was issued it was clear that NECC was closely tied to Medical Sales Mangement and that its records were interconnected. The brief states that it would be "absurd" to require that federal agents know what they had yet to find out.
Such information could not have been known by the government prior to conducting the first search warrant," the filing states.
Stating the information sought was "as specific as possible," and the devices seized were "well within the description."
The filing concludes by stating that there was "no evidence whatsoever" that the federal agent involved in the search and warrants was "dishonest or reckless" in preparing the affidavit justifying the search.
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